Friday, 30 December 2016

For the first time in my life I'm not blond. I've finally dyed my hair for the first time.

I know this may not seem like such a big deal, but it kind of is for me.

Because the most "radical" thing I've done with my hair before this is like:

Wearing an extension for 3-4 times in high school (but not AT school).

Getting an asymmetrical haircut.

And the most "notable" thing about my hair has probably been how it looks in the morning:

At least my roommate gets a laugh out of it.

So maybe in this light, dyeing my hair so dark seems at least a bit more radical?

The truth is, as a child, I wanted black hair for as long as I can remember. (I know, the grass is always greener...) But, no one around me was supportive of that idea. As a child, I didn't have guts to dye it anyway. I was way too concerned about what other people thought was appropriate.

When I was 12, my mom let me try one black stripe. We dyed it at home, and, of course it turned out purple, not black. (I think my mom knew my hair was too light for that dye, but didn't tell me so I would believe I couldn't dye my hair black...) And then, the next day I went to school my friend actually screamed when she saw me. "What have you done to your beautiful blond hair?!?"

I had just convinced myself that the purple stripe was kind of neat, so that didn't encourage me much. The colour faded away in a week.

Eventually I figured out it wouldn't turn out purple if I went to a hair dresser, so I started asking people what they would say if I dyed my hair black. Basically everyone rejected the idea right away and said I would look like a ghost.

The truth is, they were probably right. I was always the palest person wherever I went, and my noexistent eyebrows and facial features probably wouldn't have helped.

So, after a while I was convinced I could never have black hair and learned to appreaciate what nature had given me THE END.

Well, I didn't really have anything against blond hair in the first place, but I guess I did eventually learn to love it better than I did as a child. And it definitely feels better now that I didn't dye my hair because I hated my natural colour. I dyed it because I just felt like doing it.

Sometime ago, a year-ish, I think, my roommate (who is also naturally blond) and I started talking about dyeing our hair, because we both were kind of fed up with this "good girl" label that people so often put on blond girls. (At least in Finland, where it's a common colour.)

She'd been interested in trying out red hair for some time, and so we started talking about it more. At first it was: "IF I dyed my hair, it would be dark/red. "Then it became: "Someday, I'll dye my hair dark/red." So, then we finally decided we were going to do it. Because when exactly is "someday"?

And...

The thing is, I'm not exactly as pale anymore as I was as a child. I'm still pale, but I no longer look anemic.

And I draw my eyebrows on now, so my face has a lot more expression on it than back then.

I still figured black was too intense, but I came up with a nice compromise. I dyed my hair dark brown, only two shades away from black.

It looks black on me, doesn't it?

So my friend also has now red hair. Very deep burgundy. It looks amazing. Apparently this kind of change is rare enough that we were the event of the day at the salon!

Wednesday, 21 December 2016

I don't know if I have so regular
readers that anyone would really notice I've been gone the whole
autumn... but I'm writing this post for my own reflection. I've been
so busy and so much has happened that I need to digest it better than
I've been able to, since I can finally breath (for three weeks) now
that it's Christmas time. So I'll just list the things I find
important.

Wrote a book

I've never written a book this fast, in
two months, and given how busy I was with other stuff, I was pretty
amazed that I actually did it. (I had a deadline for a competition,
so I guess that helped.) It usually takes me about a year to write a
book. I take a lot of time pondering, rewriting all the time before
the first draft is anywhere near complete, doodling the characters
and having fun in the world I'm writing in. But this time I just
wrote without even reading much of what I'd written in the previous
day, and it still turned out surprisingly coherent. It's a comtemporary YA novel set in high school, and it's mostly about identity struggles.

I have a bad tendency to hate my
writing exactly at the moment I'm supposed to submit it somewhere. It
didn't happen with this one. I'm kind of worried it's only because I
didn't have enough time to be critical about it, but... I guess it's
still worth it. The feeling that you're still in love with what
you're submitting. I honestly still love the book. What's also weird
is, that it's in a different way than before. I usually have a really
hard time parting with the characters. I want to write more about
them, even though the story is done, and I know writing more would
only lead to bad and unnecessary sequels. But with this one I was
just completely satisfied with the story I'd written for these
characters and didn't feel like I'd need to write more. I love these
characters but just one book is okay. How odd.

A doodle of my protagonist.

I have to confess though, that I did
run into some interesting side characters, who only appear once or
twice in the story but I got so interested in them, that I'm planning
their own books for them now.

Anyway, it's nice to know now that I
can write rather fast when I want to. I might just do it
again. :D

Participated in two writing
competitions

So yeah, the other one was mentioned
above. And I think the ”participating in a competition” part was
and is probably always going to be harder for me than the writing the
book part. I guess in a way it's easier than just submitting to a
publisher (we don't use agents in Finland) because you have a
deadline. It's very hard for me to decide something is ready enough
for professional eyes so a deadline helps. But only kind of. It still
feels like it's never ready enough, and I always should've edited it
more and more.

And writing a synopsis. That's
amazingly hard for me. I didn't write the book so that I could
squeeze it into two pages, you know? I wrote it exactly because the
story can't be told in two pages! Yes, I know it's important to be
able to summarize the main ideas and plot points, and I don't think
I'm even bad at it. I just hate it. Because that's not the way you're
supposed to go into the story.

The other one was a short story
competition. I spent some time editing a couple of my older fantasy
stories for it. To be honest, I think they're too weird and abstract,
and not fantasy-like enough for that competition... but you never
know if you don't try. Short stories don't have the synopsis issue,
but then again, writing short stories sort of feels like writing a
synopsis for me... Yeah, long fiction is definitely my thing. Most of
the short stories I start to write actually turn into novels and I
can't help it. The truth is the ones that stay as short stories only
stay that way because I don't think they're as good. Heh.

It's not that I never have fun writing
them though.

The short story competition should
announce its winners soon, I think.

Completed two important study
modules

This was the busiest semester in years!
I'm getting closer to graduating and for me that meant doing two
pretty big combinations of courses that are required before practical
training. I mean, only one is actually required, but I have two
internships for the spring because I applied for an extra program in
pastoral psychology. Most of these courses required constant
attendance (you could only miss one class for an important reason).
Luckily I managed to attend 100 %. I had many 8 am to 6 pm days and
lots of homework too, it got easier towards the end of the semester,
but I was so busy I couldn't even think about my degree work... It's
been untouched for months. I hope I have time to complete it in the
spring. The internships will keep me busy but I hope not as busy as
this semester has been...

These courses have given me a lot,
though. I was really inspired
through all of them, and a big part of that was how great teachers I
had. Never before in my college years have I felt that the teachers
were as involved. They were not only interested in their subjects,
but us too. I'm
becoming less and less uncomfortable with public speaking because
I've finally found out that I'm fit for something. My problem has
always been my quiet, monotonous voice, and expressionless demeanor.
Turns out, in the right context, I'm not expressionless, or too
quiet, or too monotonous. I'm calm. And
it calms others. Instead of making it hard for them to follow, as it
has been with most of my academic presentations, when there's a meditative element, like there often is in a religious context,
it seems to make it easier for others to focus. It's finally a good
thing that I'm not a ”performer”! That's pretty uplifting.

The courses were full of things I'd
always had trouble with, or been unsure with, and in the end all the
feedback I got was so good I think I went home in tears for several
times. I couldn't believe I'd really done well enough to receive that
praise. It was surreal. When the pastor in charge of my group said my
sermon was so good she'd had to avoid copying it next Sunday when she
had the same topic. I was sure she was joking, but apparently she
wasn't because she repeated it to her collegue, and told me next week
that she though she managed to avoid it. I know I'm not completely
untalented for writing, at least at some level, but that kind of
feedback is rare and something to treasure. Besides I'm more
confident with my fiction, not speeches or presentations!

I'm still thinking about everything
that happened with a sense of wonder. I'm actually tearing up from
happiness as I'm writing this. There are just so many things that may
seem small alone, but together make this semester almost too amazing
for me to comprehend. I obviously had insecurities I wasn't even
aware of, since I'm so bewildered. But then again, I guess it's the
most typical of me, to believe so hard that I can do something, and
then not believe it when I actually do make it.

Participated in three ballet shows

If you take into account that we
performed some of them multiple times, then it's six.

Ballet was amazing this semester. I got
to prepare for more performances than I usually have. I didn't
improve my flexibility as much as I planned but I did improve my
pointe work a little bit. Enough to do a variation (read: easier
version) of Pizzicato passably. I'm still by far the weakest link in
my pointe/repertoire class but... it's no news for me that I still love it
all. I love struggling to dance.

I usually do three ballet classes a
week, and I couldn't have handled more this semester. I
had to take one whole week off when I was finishing my novel, and
then made up for it by taking six classes the next week. That was a
great week.

The first show we did was called Relevé
Goes Retro, and it was for celebrating the school's three year
anniversary. Yes, it's that new! I got to draw the poster/the
tickets:

My class did our can can from last
spring, and some of my friends came to see our school for the first
time, so I was actually really nervous. But all went good, as far as
I know.

The next thing was the ”dancing
display window” that has already become a tradition in the school.
This was my first time being a part of it. We did parts of our
performances for the Christmas show, so it was like a sneak peak to
that. It was really fun and weird.

The Christmas show was only a couple of
days ago. All in all, I think it was really good. I made tiny
mistakes that the audience apparently didn't see (not my friends or
parents at least), and at some point my foot just got a cramp and I
couldn't stand fully on my toes, right when I should've, but other
than that... I guess, I'm just really happy I somehow made it
through. Especially since last spring was pretty hard on me,
pointe-wise, and I couldn't even do half of the pointe classes, let
alone the performance. That was because I have this one toe that just
seems unable to do pointe. It's always in pain and the nail goes back
to black right after I've managed to heal it, no tape can make it better. But this semester I
found a silicone tube that makes it so much better I can't believe
it!

My pointe/repertoire class had two
dances: that Pizzicato variation and a dance called ”Sleepwalkers”.
To be honest we had too little time to learn them. Pizzicato
especially. It's pure technique and it felt like we lacked some of it
from the beginning to really do it well. But taking the time into
consideration I think we did rather well. I haven't seen the videos
of them yet though, so my opinion might still change, but it felt
good at least. Better than it
ever did at practice, so that's something. The sleepwalker dance is
actually very simple, the steps are easy, but I still felt like it
would've needed more practice as well, because it's very slow and has
some difficult balances which definitely could've been better. I wish
we'd get to do these another time with more practice!

My other two classes had their own
dances as well. One was a variation of the pas de trois in Bayadere.
(Not on pointe.) I had a really hard time learning a certain part of
it. I actually didn't get it completely right even once at practice
but I did get it right both times we performed it. (This is actually rather
typical of me...) And then we did a masked baroque style dance,
which always went pretty smoothly in practice and in both
performances as well. No drama there. I think I was able to purely
enjoy dancing the masked dance the most, because it felt rather
effortless. Of course, getting the part in bayadere right got me
pretty high, but then I did make a mistake somewhere I usually
didn't, and Pizzicato and the Sleepwalkers just didn't go as smoothly as the masked dance
all the way through, even though the steps were right.

Mom came to take pictures so here I am, half dressed, between shows.

I think the Christmas shows went well
enough though, for me to feel like they were a really good end for
this super busy semester. Definitely made some good memories I'm
going to treasure. Especially since I'm going away for two months,
for the internship, and will only see this beloved ballet school
again in March!

Some other honorable mentions/good
memories from this semester:

Vegan week!

My roommate and I challenged ourselves
to one vegetarian week and one vegan week. The vegetarian one was a
piece of cake but the vegan one was a real pain... I know it could've
been better if we'd prepared better and if I hadn't been so busy. But
I was, and it was really annoying to go to the store in a hurry and
not being able to buy anything I normally buy. But we made it through
and then we headed to the nearest chinese buffet on Monday right
after morning classes.

Plain old tomato spaghetti was my favourite vegatarian food of the week. (The book is Anna Gavalda's Hunting and Gathering and that was good too!)

I learned at least, that it's actually
harder for me to give up cheese than meat. Huh. I'm still such a
carnivore that raw meat makes me drool, but cheese... Cheese is even
more necessary.

Pizza with vegan cheese was definitely the most satisfying food of the vegan week.

Printed a copy of my book!

I'm rewriting this
fantasy novel and not doing anything with this old version. But my
roommate loves it, so I decided I'd give her a physical copy of it,
so she can read it easier and maybe not feel so bad when the new
version won't be anything like it.

It turned out
quite thick but I think the font and the word cout per page is
perfect!

The pages with
pictures turned out surprisingly well too!

This was the first
time for me to see a novel of mine as a ”real book” so this
experiment was really exciting for me too. It may seem silly, but it
was really fun to do this myself from the start.

I was the Slayer!

We went to this
Halloween party with my roommate, with kind of a short notice so I
was happy I was able to come up with this in one day, even if it's
not immediately regonizable and the dress isn't completely right. (It
was the only long, white dress I could find in a second hand store,
and size S so it was a miracle my chest fit in!) My roommate was
fem!Spike. xD

I tried to learn to say "I'm the slayer, ask me how!" like Buffy, but I failed miserably.

I turned into a Kataja fan!

Uh, yes, it's
basketball. My roommate dragged me along, and I tried to resist for
some time because I knew this
would happen, and I already had too many obsessions as it was. Now
it's worse. Yay!

She
was actually into it before we started watching that anime, Kuroko no
basket, but not this much. So, that series is partially to blame for
the fact we've been watching Kataja every other week or so...

Kataja's
victory (77-76) over Le Mans Sarthe in the Champions League was epic.

So there we sit, practising our common hobby on the side: typing all the players by Enneagram and MBTI. Kataja has a lot of Six.

I'm
not too mad at her for making me a fan. Because I just got her into
ballet! (Seeing our Christmas show this year was the last thing she needed to go bunhead, apparently.) So it's a win-win. After way more resistance than I ever put
up, she's signing up for a beginner class! Too bad I'm not in town
for two months... It's been like, ten years since I had a ballet dancing friend I hadn't met through ballet. I hope she'll find it fun enough to keep doing it!

My
room turned into a storage!

My
parents renovated the kitchen completely at the house... I guess I
was lucky I only had time to visit home for a couple of times this
semester. I'm pretty happy living with a kitchen!

Luckily
it's done now, that I'm back home for Christmas. But my room still
looks about the same.

Playing
badminton and ”playing badminton”!

Another
fun hobby we've been into with my roommate. Obviously we're just
playing around but it's good exercise. Sometimes we drag another
friend of ours along. It's hilarious, because most of the time he
can't even hit the shuttle but every now and then he accidentally
hits it, and it's almost impossible for us to catch. He calls it his
noobie strike.

Then
there were nights when no one else was at the gym. She wanted to
throw baskets and I was having some serious trouble with Pizzicato at
the time, so we used the opportunity. If anyone asks, we were palying
badminton like we were supposed to.

I
crashed my friend's practice.

She
got some pretty hilarious pictures of me practicing soutenu:

This looks like I'm hovering, not spinning!

Yeah, my turns are still pretty ungraceful on pointe!

I finally got around to getting myself a Hufflepuff scarf!

Especially since Pottermore has confirmed it, I've been so proud of my house. No to mention when my professor said: "Systematic theology is the Hogwards of the school of Theology. It's full of weird tricks the majors of other theological subjects don't understand." So the others are muggles! Haha. I kind of can't get into Hogwards any more officially than this!

Early
Christmas party!

I
got together with a couple of my friends before holidays started,
which was really nice since I'm going away for so long. We basically
ate ourselves sick.

Totoro's watching over me!

A friend gave me his treasured, handmade Totoro to look after me while I'm away on holidays and the internship. I was touched.

Totoro is helping me with Christmas preparations.

All in all, this semester was really full and pretty amazing. I just feel like so many lucky things happened. I definitely have a lot of energy for the next year now!

Wednesday, 7 September 2016

7. Do you listen to music while you
write? What kind? Are there any songs you like to relate/apply to
your characters?

I don't think I could listen to any songs that
have lyrics while I'm writing, and usually I concentrate better when
I'm not listening to anything at all, but I have occasionally
listened to instrumental music. Only when I'm really deep, like so inside the scene, that anything external will just become a part of it. Then I can listen to instrumental music that fits the mood. And only with really intense scenes. Like
a werewolf hunt.

I definitely do associate songs with my
(and other people's!) characters all the time everywhere. I don't
think I can naturally listen
to a song without a viewpoint of a fictional character. Yep. That's
how hopeless I am. Of course I can make the songs about something
else if I want but I have to make a conscious choice to do that. And
why would I do that,
when this is just how I get the most out of music? Fictional angles
happen naturally. For every song, there's just definitely going to be
a fictional character who could sing it, and I don't have to do
anything to find them, just listen to music and they will come.

I've
even made a game out of this, that I sometimes play with my roommate.
It's the best when you find songs that you know are meant to mean
something entirely different but all the same it makes complete sense
from the point of view of your character. Most words just have a
completely different meaning. I'm a very metaphorical person, but for
some reason it makes me grin extra wide when something that is
supposed to be metaphorical in the song, becomes literal through a
character's eyes.

Out of
my characters I've only really introduced ”Four Colours” in this
blog, so I'll list some songs I associate with them.

Thursday, 1 September 2016

I should blog more about random things that are on my mind. (Or write my diary I guess?) Because if I don't write them, I'm never going to process them out loud either.

I used to have this dumb notion that I should only blog once I have something important and universal to say. (I had to let go of that thought to even start a blog, otherwise nothing was ever going to be important enough.)

Besides what's the point? Most people who read my blog are my friends anyway.

And the reason I don't blog that much is mostly that I think about what I say too much. (Which doesn't necessarily equal quality.)

But right know the thing is that I'm so busy I'm not going to be able to blog at all if I think too much about what I say. I have possibly the busiest period ever in my school life going on right now.

I think I have to learn to get my thoughts out without being too critical about them. I mean, it should be okay if it doesn't always make sense. It's better to say something incoherent and reflect, and learn from it, than not say anything at all because every thought has to be "finished".

There are definitely a few things that keep coming back to haunt my mind even during these busy days, because I haven't really chewed on them by writing about them. That's how you can always see things in a new light afterall!

Good blogs are probably the ones that can get something general and relatable out of personal experiences, but right now I think I wouldn't mind not having that kind of standards for this blog. (I can try to do that with my typology blog if I want.) And even personal ramblings can be relatable, and I think they have their own value.

I'm not exactly sure where I'm going with this post, which feels oddly refreshing already. :D

I feel like overviewing some of the things I have in my mind but never put anywhere.

1. Books and other fiction in general

Have some bad cosplay I'm doing of my own character reading here!

I haven't had time to write proper reviews! And it makes me restless when I don't. I feel like there's a stack of books and series just waiting and waiting and getting heavier in the back of my head because I haven't gone through my love or hate or indifference for them, in a really satisfying way. I need to break them into pieces to let them settle to their rightful place in my mind.

2. My summer jobs

I had two this summer, and I definitely haven't gone through such a multifaceted work experience like... ever? At least not in a period of two months! I did talk about a couple of things that happened there with some friends, but my life has been so busy, I feel like I haven't really been able to digest it all. It's weird, because I kind of went through the highest highs and the lowest lows in my personality during these months... and they're all things I knew about myself but these jobs made me reinforce my understanding of them. I guess many of my problems and strenghts haven't been so... in my face? Not for some time. There's still stuff to think about there. (And it would be good now that I'm about to start an internship.)

3. The big career choice questions

Am I too liberal to work in a parish? Is the fact that I can talk about the matters of faith in "lutheran language", enough to actually call myself lutheran, when I could also talk about them in pretty much any "religious language" (and non-religious as well), and I only feel most at home with the lutheran one, because it's one of the "loosest laguages"? Is the fact that I could definitely be understood as an atheist, a monotheist and a pantheist, or pretty much anything else, simultaneously, depending on your understanding and use of the terms, too impractical for a priest? I'm very content in my worldview but am I content in this environment? Is this the right place to do what I want to do, to help people? I guess this school year, and the internship, will answer that question. I hope.

4. Typing

I've said this before, and this relates to my other blog, but I need to start writing my fictional character typings. It's no good to just analyze them in my head, and since I'm going to do that anyway I should at least start getting some of them out of there. To stop thinking I need to be able write my reasoning perfectly. The whole thing about typing characters is to learn more about the theory. To make the understanding of it more accurate and articulate.

5. Kuroko no basket

Yeah, really. I didn't want to admit it, but this series has had more impact on me than any other since Harry freaking Potter. And the reason I didn't want to admit it, is because it hits a little too close to home. I've never related to a fictional character as much. (For the record: No, it has nothing to do with basketball. It has to do with... everything else. Everything that can be applied elsewhere, if that makes sense.) The thing is, untill now I don't think I've ever been that aware if I relate to a character or not, because it never seemed relevant to me. It's not my comfort area to know that. I like to empathize with characters, not sympathize. I don't generally like the feeling that I'm seeing myself in there. So I have a love-hate relationship with this series. Something brings back painful memories? Easy, right: Don't watch/read it. But when I think that, I realize it's also surprisingly satisfying to feel understood. So... apparently there's still a dilemma there I need to work on.

It really was something like this at first.

6. Daily thoughts

I often find myself thinking there's some general phenomenon I'd like to write about when stuff happens during the day that relates to something like that, but then I never write about it. I forget, or there's too much going on, or I, AGAIN, feel like the thought isn't finished enough. My little inner perfectionist needs a kick or something.

7. HSP

I read Elaine Aron's book on the Highly Sensitive Person and related immensely, but, again, I feel like I haven't really had time to process this subject either (other than crying every other page and recommending it to other sensitive people). I have to have time to analyze this whole thing to pieces so I can really benefit from it.

Okay... this was really random. And really personal. I'm not saying I will blog about any of these things, but I do promise myself to write all my thoughts about them out in my diary at least.

Maybe it's not so bad to write something so personal though. Because I would really like to read things on similar level from other people's blogs!

Thursday, 28 July 2016

Of course I'd prefer it to happen
rather sooner than later. But I also try to be down to earth about
it. It's more important that I write what's important to me, and spend as much
time writing and editing it as I feel I need. I don't want to rush
because I might just be at my biggest growth spurt as a writer right now.
There's a dramatic difference in skill with the beginning and ending
of the last novel I completed. It's like they were written by a
different person, or at least years apart, not months. I know
my stuff isn't ready yet, but I'm getting so much better all the
time, so I hope that soon something is ready, that I am ready.

At the moment I'm writing for a
contemporary YA novel competition (not my usual thing) and I only
have three months to complete the novel that is still in the
beginning, since my summer job has kept me so busy, so I guess that's a goal in itself, but let it be inside
this bigger goal, since its just one way I'm trying to achieve this.

After that, I have my fantasy series to
complete, which is still probably going to take me more than a couple
of years, since it was only half way through and then I started
writing the first book all the way from the beginning again...

2. To improve my drawing/Strenghten my
style

I've only recently realized how much
I've been trying to draw ”by the book” all these years. How much
I've been trying to do the same as those who are actually good at it.
But it has struck me: Why would I try to draw like people who don't
draw for the same reasons or aren't about expressing the same things
I want to express? I'm bad with anatomy. So what? I don't even want
to draw realistically, so that shouldn't be my main concern. I'm good
with faces, expressions, colours and contrast. And those are enough
to express what I actually want to: feelings and atmosphere. It
doesn't mean I don't need to get better at anatomy. It just means I
should approach it in favour of the things that are more important to
me, on their terms, to strengthen them.

I don't want to draw a mountain so that
you can see in detail exactly what this particular mountain looks
like. I want to draw so that I can make you believe there is a
mountain there, and that it's there for a reason.

Not so good, no.

That's going in the right direction.

3. To improve my flexibility

This is probably my weakest area in
ballet. Well, not in every single place, it seems my sides are more
flexible than average and my attitudes and arabesques aren't half
bad, so I guess my back isn't that stiff either. But I can't do a
spagat, and I've never been able to lift my leg all the way up along
my side with my hand on my heel. I guess I haven't really had to
worry about it enough before, in class it's been enough to just do
everything to the extend you can. But in our last performance we did
can-can and we were supposed to end it in a spagat. There was only one
other person besides me, who had to cheat, hiding the other leg under
the big can-can skirt, since we couldn't get it straight.

This was the can-can skirt.

So, I'm trying to make it a habit to
stretch my legs everytime I'm reading or watching something. So far,
it's really hard. I might have to ask for someone's advice... so far
I've only heard ”Just stretch untill it stops hurting” but the
problems is, it doesn't. It just gets more painful. Either I'm doing
something wrong, or the problem is that I've only been asking people who are
naturally flexible.

My heels are my true achilles' heels,
as well. (Heh heh, not so funny... I'm sorry, I couldn't help that.)
They're just naturally stiffer than those of most non-dancers I know.
Yeah... sad. I'm always worried that someday, they'll just snap. I'm
trying to do something about them as well, since it makes me cheat in
pirouettes, which is a shame, since otherwise, those are basically my only strong suit.

I type all the time. If
I haven't typed someone I've read/watched it's because a) They're
really hard for me to type and it's an on-going process or b) they
aren't realistic enough to type which probably also means they
weren't very interesting as a character.

But for some reason when it comes to
actually writing about those typings, I keep putting it off. I guess
I want to be exactly 112% sure of their MBTI, enneagram tritype,
wing, and instinctual variants before writing anything.

But I want to do this because 1) It's
just so interesting, plain and simple. 2) It's a good field for
discussion, since when you're talking about real people, you can only
really do it with someone who knows the person as well as you.
Fictional characters can have so wide audiences. Sure, you can
discuss celebrities too, but 3) you can get the thought processes of
a character from the fictional work way easier than you can get real
people's thought processes, and that's why, when it comes to the
theory, I find fictional characters a better learning tool than real
people. (Of course, I always recommend watching real people for
practical learning, but the theory is just as important and the
fictional characters are ideal for that.)

5. Finish my degree work

Yeah, the most boring goal. Okay, it's
not like I'm not interested in my subject, of course I chose
something that overlaps with literature, so I have an excuse to read
more fiction: The images of God in self-published Christian fiction.
That's my subject. I've read my material and I know approximately
what's going to be in every chapter, and I think I've found some
interesting spectrums and dichotomies in the way the concept of God is formed and used in these
stories.

But you know, writing fiction and
blogging about personality theories is just so much more interesting
than actually doing the work: the academic writing. (Sorry I'm going
to go Jungian here:) It's. So. Extraverted Thinking. It's always the
same thing for me as an Ni-Ti looper: I don't actually do the work
the way I have to present it. The Te part of the work is the last
part I do. I fake it every single time, I've done that since middle
school porfolios, since you're expected to reach your conclusion in a
certain step by step manner. But I can't do that. I get to the
conclusions first, I come to them in a complicated web of
relationships of cause and effect, and then I have to go back and
figure out how exactly I would've have gotten there, if I was using
Te. And it's tedious.

But, my goal is to be done by
Christmas. Unlike fiction, I write school papers the best in the
morning, when I've specifically woken up to do them. So I'll have to
welcome early mornings once summer's done.

This is the book that made me want to research Christian fiction. Check it out!

Wednesday, 27 July 2016

6. Where are you most comfortable
writing? At what time of day? Computer or good ol' pen and paper?

Short answer: In my room, at night, on
my laptop.

Long answer: I don't think my
comfortableness has anything specific to do with my room, I just need
a place where I can focus. And it's not usually a place with other
people there, because they would get my attention way too much.
Sometimes, when I'm already in a great flow I can block out pretty
much any sensory information and write anywhere but not on an average
day. People are far too interesting.

Specifically, I usually write on my bed rather than the desk.

Sometimes I do get fed up with my room
though, and that's when I go to the library. I can usually find a
quiet enough corner there and when I'm not in the writing mood
exactly, going somewhere specifically to write, helps me get over the
difficulties.

One of my favourite spots.

I write any time of the day I can, but
it's true most of my writing and the best of my writing has probably
always been done at night. That's when I usually feel my best in
general. My natural waking hours seem to be something like from 12 am
to 3 am, whenever I don't have school. Morning is probably the least
likely time for me to write, but I remember a few times I've
miraculously gotten up early and started writing, and then it's been
great. But it's really rare. When I don't have school and I get
immersed in writing I write pretty much all the time, barely eat or
sleep, untill I'm done with what I want to finish (but that usually
lasts max three days).

I write on a computer because it's
easier to edit on it. It took me a lot of time to get used to it,
though. I prefered pen and a notebook untill my first year of high
school when I decided I couldn't keep it that way forever. Now I'm
fully in tune with the computer.

My personality typing blog:

Search This Blog

Follow by Email

Subscribe To

Fancy seeing you here!
This is a space of a bookworm, so you've been warned. I'm nerdier than I look and more random than I appear.
Whenever you really need a listener, I will be interested and compassionate. When I seem aloof, don't mind me, I just have a lot of other worlds to keep on track with. You're welcome to pull me back into this one.
I'm eager to talk to people with similar interests, so if you find any of my stuff worth it, don't hesitate to talk to me!